Ul competition document

CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY LIBRARY LANDSCAPE DESIGN COMPETITION

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ABOUT THE COMPETITION The University Cambridge Department of Architecture and the Cambridge University Library invites you to take part in an innovative design competition in Cambridge to elicit fresh and unexpected ideas for the environment, landscape and entrance sequence to the University Library. The competition aims actively to encourage creative and unconventional approaches to the challenging brief of responding to the imposing architecture of the Library in order to bring about a transformation of its external environment. This is a two stage, open ideas competition for a site that is integral to the life of the University.

In order to realise this vision and foster cross community engagement, a panel of assessors from a range of disciplines, backgrounds, ages and sectors will organise workshops and events, and select prize winning ideas and designs, which will form the basis for a public exhibition, local schools campaign and publication to exemplify commitment to environmental design at Cambridge.

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THE LIBRARY Cambridge University Library is a core research environment for academics and students. It is one of six UK Legal Deposit Libraries and is also home to an extensive collection of unique and distinctive materials that make it a destination for local, national and international academics alike. However, the Library is more than its collections and research spaces, it is part of the daily life of the University, a gathering place for students and academics, and a social hub during the working day.

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The building is impressively austere and has a monumental presence within the City and the University. This competition prompts entrants to challenge the imposing nature of the Giles Gilbert Scott building, to stimulate new uses for the site surrounding it, and provide new visibility to the library’s public collections. We are seeking innovative strategies for an accessible and sustainable landscape and a new vision the institution’s engagement with its environment.

This competition would like to encourage a broad range of approaches to the site at a range of scales and levels of complexity. Entries will be judged on their innovative interpretation of the site, its context, use, and history and their ability to apply this understanding to the design of an exceptional, forward-thinking landscape / building proposal.

We also expect each submission to take full advantage of the contemporary ecological research to provide a responsive and technologically intelligent proposal for construction and subsequent use of their proposals.

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STAGE 1A - WORKSHOPS

STAGE 1B – IDEAS STAGE

(no formal registration or fee required) The first stage of the competition will consist of a series of events and workshops hosted by the Department of Architecture. This will bring together cross-disciplinary groups from within the University, other key stake-holders, and elicit ideas from primary, secondary and sixth-form colleges in Cambridge. A free downloadable DIY competition brief is also available on the competition website for schools, groups or organizations that would like to use the competition as part of their curriculum. The record of these events will be uploaded on the competition website. Twenty proposals resulting from these sessions will be selected for exhibition and publication along with the registered competition shortlist.

Fully registered participants will produce well resolved proposals for the development of the landscape surrounding the University Library, A shortlist of 10 will be selected according to how they respond to the criteria and ambitions of the brief. Winners will supply a clearly articulated description of the proposed intervention.

A supplementary design workshop programme has been devised as a platform for broader participation in the project. The programme is available for download on the competition website (URL). We will post the results of these workshops online during the course of the competition and would like to encourage a wide range of participants from all age-groups and backgrounds to take part. Ongoing design consultancy with stakeholders from a range of sources, (users and community members), to be broadcast via the website.

Initially open to all, to be taken forward at a later stage should funding become available.

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STAGE 2 - DESIGN / COLLABORATION STAGE

In the second phase, ten designs will be selected from the entries received during the first phase. These designs will be taken forward with the support of a small honorarium and an academic consultant from a Cambridge Department (to be chosen by each designer from the short list appended).

This will give designers the opportunity to advance the detail of their design and to refine the social, technical or cultural direction of the design in conversation with a relevant academic. The results of this collaboration will be exhibited and published as a book containing the final proposals and a critical academic response to each.

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REGISTRATION / HOW TO ENTER

ELIGIBILITY

Competition applicants must officially register through the competition website (TBA) and obtain a Registration Number that will be the source of identifying entries in the first stage of the judging. The competition requires a non-refundable registration and administration fee of £50.00 (+VAT) and the completion and upload of the ‘Release of Ordnance Survey Data to 3rd Parties form’ (available on the website). This fee is waived for those under 18 years of age and those with full-time student status.

This is an open competition eligible to all individuals or teams excluding employees and immediate family members of the competition team and the selected jurors. Entrants under the age of 18 should include at least one adult on their design team.

Please visit http://www.cambridgelibrarylandscape.com and follow the link to ‘Live Competitions’ to make an on-line payment. For alternative payment options, please contact cambridge.library.competition@gmail.com Once your payment has been processed you will be sent a Unique Registration Number and Password.

All queries and responses will be posted for the availability of all registered entrants on the competition website. In the interests of anonymity all queries should be made through the website rather than via direct email contact. No mention of individual or company names should be mentioned in the queries.

QUERIES

This will allow you access to the following: CAD compatible version of Ordnance Survey extract.

Site constraints drawing: Including access, property ownership, gradient, planning considerations.

Environmental Report including: Climatic data, Soil data, Geological considerations, Ecological conditions.

Historic map material and photographs.

Plans and sections of University Library Building.

Historic images of University Library Building.

Declaration of Authorship form.

Usage statistics of Library and site usage

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THE SITE HISTORY OF THE LIBRARY The current University Library building was completed in 1934 under architect Giles Gilbert Scott, who also designed the neighbouring Clare Memorial Court (part of Clare College). It bears a marked resemblance to Scott’s industrial architecture, a famous example of which is Bankside Power Station, the home of the Tate Modern. The University Library is the central research library and holds over 8 million items, and, in contrast with the Bodleian or the British Library, many of its books are available on open shelves. It is one of the six Legal Deposit Libraries in the UK entitled to request a free copy of every book published in the UK and Ireland.

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THE LIBRARY AND THE SITE The University Library is located just under a kilometre from the centre of Cambridge, its market square. Situated in West Cambridge, the Library today represents the heart of the expanded University that continues to grow outwards away from the city centre. While there are many libraries in Cambridge, the University Library, due to its size and importance of its collections, is heavily used by academics and students from Cambridge and the United Kingdom as well as international scholars.

The University Library site is framed on all sides by significant institutions and features. South of the Library, King’s College School, Robinson College to the West, the Memorial Court expansion to Clare College in the East, and on the Northern Edge, Burrell’s Walk, a small yet heavily used pedestrian and cycle thoroughfare that leads directly into the city centre.

Each of these contribute to foot traffic through the site, with students, local residents and school children making use of the natural ‘shortcut’ that the landscape surrounding the library affords. Furthermore, lying between Robinson College and the University Library site is Grange Road, a major arterial route for West Cambridge that links several of the University Colleges, namely: Clare Hall, Selywn, Girton, St. Edmunds, Wolfson, Newnham and Robinson. Also bordering the site is the Cambridge University Real Tennis building, adding to the foot traffic through the site. Approximately 25% of properties in the vicinity of the site are privately owned residences.

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At present, the site is predominately reserved for parking, with little provision for public use. As with most of Cambridge, the site has minimal gradient and is accessible from all sides. In contrast, the main entrance to the library itself is raised above grade by half a story, resulting in a vertical disconnect between the Library and its surroundings.

SITE VISIT : The areas of the library relating to the brief are open to the public. Mondays to Fridays 09.00 - 19.00 09.00 - 18.45 Saturdays 09.00 17:00

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VISION / PUBLIC SPACE The purpose of this competition in its first phase is to generate a broad spectrum of approaches to the surroundings of the University Library. We are looking forward to the work revealing potential new uses for the space surrounding the Library and radical means of exploiting the building’s history, location and use in this changing part of the city. We expect landscape proposals to consider the rich garden tradition in Cambridge but also to consider radical and sustainable solutions to expanding the Library’s threshold and to introduce new uses for this intermediary space. While alterations to the existing building are outside the scope of this competition, we look forward to projects that, through inventive programming, might mediate the scale of the Library itself, and test its public use with the confidence of the Tate Modern’s turbine hall or the extensive public foyer of the British Library. In this respects the formal requirements are to act as a very general guideline.

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PROJECT REQUIREMENTS 1. PUBLIC ROLE

5. ACCESS

Entrants should seek to promote the public use of the space surrounding the University Library and increase the accessibility of public exhibitions curated by the Library through the re-design of its landscape.

The Library site is not only accessed by a high volume of users from both the University and beyond, but it is a well used thoroughfare for cyclists and walkers travelling to and from the West of Cambridge. The site is bounded by several areas of College accommodation, a popular primary school and many University departments. The proposals should recognise the needs of all library users, including elderly or disabled readers as well as cyclists, commuters and young children passing through the site. Entries should be clear in their strategies for securing access for these different groups.

2. CLIMATE/ENVIRONMENT The proposals should demonstrate a clear understanding of the environmental and climatic factors affecting the site and show how these are affected by the new design.

3. SITE

6. PARKING

Designs should show a clear grasp of the site’s location a range of scales.

Proposals should demonstrate a good understanding of the site, its use, character and access and seek to exploit these existing factors where advantageous.

While most Cambridge academics and students arrive to the Library by bicycle or on foot, the transport and car-parking needs of library users living outside of Cambridge and disabled library users should not be overlooked.

4. USEAGE

7. SAFETY

Submissions will show how they affect the usage of the site for a range of types of visitor, and demonstrate an understanding of how this use shifts through the day, the week and in and out of University term.

The site is open to cyclists and pedestrians 24 hours a day and is an important thru-fare. It will be important to maintain a sense of safety in these areas, particularly in the winter months.

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8. BUILT STRUCTURES This competition does not require a building proposal but we also welcome entries that include a building component if appropriate.

9. CONSTRUCTION All proposals should demonstrate a strong understanding of the processes and materials required for their realisation.

10. MAINTENANCE / ADAPTABILITY

SUPPLEMENTARY CONSIDERATIONS This second stage of the competition gives the shortlisted contributors the opportunity of refining their position in consultation with a leading University academic and to consider the historical, economic and or biological significance of their proposals and its effect on the surrounding context. In this respect the second stage of this competition uses each shortlisted entry as a springboard for further discussion and potential research innovation. With the help of a selected expert, the short-listed entrants will be asked to push their ideas further to identify areas of research innovation, to examine the role of Library within the evolution of the city and the University, and to explore new models for public engagement.

The work proposed should consider the long term maintenance and adaptability of the site over time.

11. LEGACY We would like entrants to also consider the wider implications of their proposal and to use their work to explore new, unexpected uses for the site and to question what this might mean for the future that the Library has within the life of an expanding city.

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JURY Hannah Barry (Curator and Gallerist) Mary Beard (University of Cambridge) Liza Fior (MUF) Nichola Harrison (Cambridge Councillor) Anne Jarvis (University Librarian) Tom Stuart-Smith (Landscape Architect)

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TO ENTER REGISTRATION/SUBMISSION PROCESS

ANONYMITY

All individuals or teams submitting an entry must register and submit digitally

All entries will be reviewed by the jury anonymously. Thus, all submitted text and

through the competition website. On this website, you will be guided through the

images must be free from any marks,logos or writing that identifies authorship. The

registration process, including the creation of a unique account and registration

presence of any such insignia will result in disqualification.

ID number/s. Following registration, you will be guided through the submission

AWARDS

process (see below for submission requirements).

SUBMISSION REQUIREMENTS

Professional category: 10 shortlisted entrants to receive a £2000 honorarium to proceed to Stage 2 and funding and publicity for subsequent publication and

All submissions must be submitted digitally through the competition website.

exhibition. There will be three final prizes: 1st Prize £1000, 2nd Prize £750, 3rd

After being guided through the creation of a unique, anonymous registration ID,

prize £500

competition entrants will be prompted to submit required items. Submission of entries must be in A3 format with all images at 300dpi and a maximum of ten pages

Student category: 10 entries will be selected form the workshop stage (1A) and be

to be uploaded on the competition website (1 A3 board = 420 x 297 mm / 16.5 x

awarded £200 each, further printing, exhibition or publication of the work will be

11.7 in). All panels should include you Unique Registration Number and no other

funded.

forms of identification. The panels can run together or stand alone as separate sheets. The zipped image file name must correspond to your unique registration number.

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OVERVIEW OF THE COMPETITION KEY DATES 8 July 2013 Competition officially announced / workshop sessions introduced 1 September - 30 November 2013 Sponsored workshops 30th September 2013 Final date for registration and fee payment

DEADLINES All entry submissions must be uploaded by 30th November 2013 at midnight (11:59 pm.GMT). Competitors will be responsible for the arrival of their proposals within the corresponding deadlines and no proposal will be received one day after the date previously stated.

This competition has been made possible by Lisbet Rausing and Peter Baldwin.

DISCLAIMER

30st November 2013 Closing date for submissions

Cambridge Design Research Studio reserve the right to refuse any entry. The organization is

1st- 31th December 2013 Jury evaluation

not liable for lost or misdirected, late or substantially incomplete entrees, as well as entries containing text/images that identify the Competitors to the Jurors. The decisions and opinions of the Jurors represent their professional view points, not the opinion of the organizers.

15th January 2014 Announcement of Winners to be posted on competition website-

All prises will be awarded at the discretion of the organizers and all decisions are final. All materials for this competition must be submitted in digital format, via the competition website. Competitors retain standard ownership of their intellectual property. Upon registering

January 2014 Design stage 2 / academic collaboration launched

for this competition, all Competitors agree to waive any and all claims against CDRS and any affiliated organisation as a result of the competition. Also, by registering, the competitors transfer unlimited use for publication, exhibition and electronic posting of all entries and

1 June 2014 Final submissions submitted for publication.

right to release any of the submitted materials to the media for public use and will credit the Competitors responsible for author the work. All images must either be created by Competitor or Competitors or sufficiently cited. This competition, has no intention to award or grant any

End September 2014 Book Launch / Exhibition

building contracts for the designs submitted in this competition.

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